Damage
by Chairantula
Summary: Alejandro visits an old colleague who's not thrilled to see him. In fact, she pushes him away at her own detriment, but it's not until it's too late does she realize that she's no less damaged than he is. If you take what's left of two people and put it together, does it make anything whole at all? (AlejandroxOC or AlejandroxKate)(post-movie or Au: T for language)


_**AN: Rewatched the movie and had wanted to do something the first time but never got around to it. You can read this as being an OC/FC or as Kate since she worked in the hostage division, had no close family and may have dabbled in interrogation, which is why the character is never given a name in this. This takes place after the first movie. I haven't seen the second so I can't say if this would work after the second film, between them or only as an AU.**_

She didn't need to look up to know he was there. Even before Erasmus perked his ears and stood at attention, his presence put her innermost animal on alert. It reminded her of her nights out in the desert when the coyotes stood at the edge of firelight and watched.  
"I thought you'd be gone for good, now that you got your revenge." she said without taking her eyes off of Erasmus' harness.  
She heard a soft scoff. He hated when she called it that, but he was past repeating to her that it was more than that.  
It was justice and it was a warning. Yes, his wife and daughter were avenged, but more, they would never recover fully from knowing they were so easily infiltrated and their head lopped off. What's more, that he did what he needed and got out. It wasn't an act of blind fury. It was a cold and calculated and a man so detached as to avenge his loved ones with surgical precision, it scared the shit out of them.

It scared her a little too, but she never let it be evident. He knew, and she knew that, but he couldn't prove it, and that kept her safe. As long as she felt nothing for nobody, she was safe.  
She gripped the t-strap of Erasmus' harness. Even her canines were a potential weak spot, so she had to regard them as tools and wouldn't let herself be around them when they were off duty. It was lonely, but the solitude had made her valuable.  
She realized it had been quiet for too long and she looked behind her shoulder thinking that she might have just imagined him, but he was seated on the corner of a folding table giving her the same faraway look he'd always had since-

"As far as anybody is concerned, I am." he finally said.  
She stood and turned to face him. Erasmus moved to sit beside her with his eyes fixed on him. He didn't even bat an eye at the robotically efficient attack animal.  
"So what are you doing here then."  
He glanced at Erasmus, "Cute dog."  
She smirked. "He leaves a cute gouge too. So c'mon, Alejandro. ¿Qué onda?"  
He was quiet again. Everything he did seemed to be subject to the same mental wringing as his work. "You know what."  
"You can't even say it. Why should I believe you." She let out a sharp exhale. "You know what happens. You know why- I don't even know why you came all this way when you know damn well it's impossible."  
Sensing her irritation, Erasmus let out a muffled, throaty bark. "Tsst" She emitted a sharp hiss from the side of her mouth and he became silent again, assured that his master was in control.  
"What's the end game?" She asked, arms crossed.  
He stood up. "There is no end game. It's not a game."  
"Sure the fuck feels like it."  
All three of them were quiet with only the flickering fluorescent lights buzzing overhead.  
She was the first to speak again, "You know I don't take risks. I'm not you. How do you think I got this far? Got out?"  
"Do you think it's luck that I where I am now?" he asked sternly.  
"No, of course not. But that works for you. Not me. I only just started being able to sleep again." She threw her arms up. "I've been clean for two months. I can't go back to that. If I ever have to live another day constantly looking over my shoulder and leaping out of my skin from a dead sleep-" she trailed off and her eyes rose from her feet to meet his. "I don't sleep with a gun just for security."  
He could hear the shame in her voice. She felt weak admitting this to him. Truth was, he understood perfectly well. He also understood that she was one of the least weak women he knew. She came in boots to the dirt and left with her heels dragging behind her. She was zero to sixty when it was needed, the second it was needed. It was like heroin and it wasn't until she was discharged did it all come crashing onto her. She was good at what she did because of who was.  
To be interrogated by a man? That was run of the mill stuff you heard as a kid growing up and were made immune to. You never heard about the women who did it. You never heard about a woman who could walk in and ever so cruelly fill you with relief and assurance just long enough to make you relax so that when the terror hit you, it put you into shock and made you doubt the reality you grew up into. You never heard about the woman who could make you terrified and confused; who made you panic whether or not there was something far worse coming because you were taught that women were weak and stupid. It was a unique brand of psychological torture that she excelled at.  
"Aren't you sick of it yet?"  
"There's a point where it becomes useless. Angry," he crossed his arms and shrugged, "tired, sad. What good does it do? Who does it help?"  
She uttered a disgusted grunt. "So that's what it's come to. You've outlasted me, almost everybody but for what? To become a shell of a person who's only emotion is bloodlust. That family-"  
"That family was collateral. He knew what that life was. You can't go easy on these people, you know that! You of all people know that."  
"Whatever you gotta tell yourself so you can sleep at night."  
"That's just it. I don't sleep. I'm not as soulless as you seem to think. I'm haunted too, but I won't push everybody away. You're not the only one with blood on their hands!"  
"Are you serious? You are the last person to talk to me about pushing people away! You know what happens to us, to people we love. Yet, here you are. You just haven't done enough damage, have you?"  
"I _fix_ damage."  
"Fix your own damn damage before unfixing mine. I need to go, and so do you."  
She passed him with Erasmus at her heels. She expected him to grab her, but he looked across the room at where she'd been and was motionless. She wasn't sure if it was Erasmus who stopped him, or himself, but she could almost believe that he was already fixing some of his own damage.  
She didn't look back as she walked down the hall and passed through the secured doors.  
When she pulled out of her parking spot, he was at the entrance, leaning against the brick pillar. With his sunglasses on, she couldn't tell if he was watching her, but she was sure he was.  
She gripped her steering wheel. She was angry at him for coming back after so long, after she had gotten her shit together. He reminded her of everything she hated about that life and all of the shit that came with it. He re-entered her life so callously, with no regard for it and what his presence might re-kindle.  
 _'Isn't that just like him.'_ she thought bitterly. _'Whatever it took for him, no matter who it hurt. He may be able to shrug it off or shoulder it without batting an eye, but we're not all heartless bastards.'_  
She sighed loudly, "I'm glad I got out when I did. When I had some semblance of humanity left."  
Erasmus grumbled from the backseat, sensing her anxiety.  
"Don't worry about me, boy. That's not your job. That's not anybody's job."  
She furrowed her brow at the memory of her saying those exact words to him long ago.  
 _"Of course it's not. It's an obligation of the people who care about you."_ he had said.  
 _"What's the difference."_  
" _They worry because they care about you, not because they have to. I'm worried about you."_  
She stopped at a red light and watched people cross in front of the cars. They looked so carefree. They'd probably never worried about anything more serious than a late bill.  
"What good does it do." She found herself quoting him, "Who does it help."  
She looked at Erasmus through the rear-view mirror. His cocked his head slightly at her.  
"Me. He was trying to help me. He understands everything. He knows. He of all people knows. Why though? What does he get out of it? What happens if he's still in that life? Everything will have been for nothing."  
Her gaze moved past the pedestrians to the park across the t-intersection. It wasn't a park though, it was a cemetery. Even in the midday sun, the stones were lonely and the eternal non-existence that lay beneath them reminded her.  
"When I die, it will have all been for nothing anyway. None of it will have made a difference. So do I die alone, or do I die like I left service?"  
She gently accelerated and turned past the cemetery.  
 _'Has he already asked this of himself? Is that why he came back?'_

She couldn't imagine him being worried about it. He'd been toe to toe with death so many times that they called each other by name and asked about each other mother's. It was as though he'd given up after the death of his wife and daughter. The way there killed. And he'd seen it. She didn't know if it was in person or through other means, but he wasn't spared the nightmares of their final moments. It haunted him like every death he'd inflicted.  
 _'You know what happens to us, to people we love.'_

She winced. Did he believe that he'd inflicted death upon his wife and daughter too? Because of the line of work they were in?  
She hadn't lost anybody the way he did because of how she led her life. But was it any better to die having loved and lost than to have never loved at all?  
She smirked sourly. It was sickeningly cliche. But it was true. He had lost people because he had loved. She'd lost nobody because she'd love nobody.  
She was lonelier than he was and it was her own fault.  
She had a chance to change it, but she shat on it and left it in the sun. Just like every other chance she'd had to change it.  
"Guess I'm not as fixed as I thought." She murmured as she pulled down an empty, one-way street with the sun to her back and the dim horizon spread before her.

 _ **Sorry about any formatting issues. I couldn't get the paragraphs right without fucking up the rest of the paragraphs in a domino effect sort of thing. At this point, I'm not sure if this will stay a one-shot or if I'll continue this. And if I continue this, I'm not sure if I'll include any real romance elements in it. I've never actually written a fic based on a live-action source so it's sort of weird to me writing about actors' characters.**_  
 _ **Let me know in the reviews what you think. Please save the 15 yo tier flaming/trolling for 4chan, too because I don't really care if you think your e-peen is huge and needs to be swung around like a trophy you got for your niche fanfic writing hobby.**_


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